Community Action Warehouse Variance Approved

by Jonathan Weaver

Armstrong County Community Action agency will have a new location to distribute food to those in need.

Following two separate days of public testimony before the East Franklin Township zoning hearing board, zoning hearing board members voted 2-1 at the December 12 hearing to issue a variance and allow construction of a 4,800-square-foot food storage warehouse near its current offices along Butler Road.

Several conditions are necessary to abide as well.

A hearing was also held November 3, but it was continued to allow board members to further assess evidence and exhibits.

During peak months, Community Action serves approximately 1,450 households in Armstrong County – about five percent of the county’s population.

In October, the Walmart Foundation donated $75,000 to Armstrong County Community Action Food Bank to purchase a new refrigerated box truck with a tailgate lift in order to help transport fresh produce and meat from local store donations to deliver to food bank clients.

Township Zoning Officer Greg McKelvey also reported this month that he issued three permits – including a zoning permit for the planned construction of a Rachel’s Roadhouse restaurant near the entrance to the Franklin Village Mall.

The restaurant will be built on the property that formerly occupied Ponderosa Steakhouse – which closed December 6, 2015.

Permits were also written for a concrete pad to house an emergency back-up generator at the Medical Arts Building near the ACMH campus and to install a new storefront sign in Hilltop Plaza.

In other news, at the final supervisors meeting of 2016 held last night, Supervisors David Stewart and Dan Goldinger approved a resolution to approve transit consolidation study results coordinated by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) for potential regional coordination between Armstrong and Indiana County.

East Franklin Township was the last board decision to be held, after Armstrong County Commissioners and the other six Town and Country Transit board municipalities (Applewold, Ford City, Kittanning, Manorville, Manor Township, and West Kittanning) also voted in favor of the resolution.

At a commissioners’ meeting earlier this month, Town and Country Transit General Manager Patti Lynn Baker said the PennDOT study was to see if financial savings are possible through a joint effort between both county transit agencies, but results are non-binding.

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